MUBI Will Be ‘Mouth Watering’ In December

Christmas is getting close and unearths different emotions for all of us. For MUBI in December, things will be about to get ‘mouth watering’ even little ‘naughty’!
The festive Mati Diop’s award-winning Dahomey as well as Diop’s debut feature Atlantics. Instead of thinking about the big Christmas food shop you can enjoy the culinary and mouth-watering spectacle The Taste of Things starring Juliette Binoche. Looking for frolics under the mistletoe The Naughty List: Alternative Christmas Classics, three Christmas Crackers from Ealing Studios, Tinto Brass and Caligula: The Ultimate Cut, not one to watch with the family on Boxing Day!
MUBI RELEASES: DAHOMEY
Winner of the 2024 Berlinale Golden Bear, Mati Diop’s Dahomey (2024) is a poetic and immersive documentary that delves into real perspectives on far-reaching issues surrounding appropriation, self-determination and restitution. Set in November 2021, the film charts 26 royal treasures from the Kingdom of Dahomey that are due to leave Paris and return to their country of origin: the present-day Republic of Benin. Using multiple perspectives Diop questions how these artefacts should be received in a country that has reinvented itself in their absence.
Split into two halves, Diop begins the film with a focus on the exacting precision that goes into relocating artefacts from one museum to another, and in the process gives voice to one of the artefacts, Number 26, who is given autonomy to ruminate on experiencing colonialist plunder first-hand. The film then pivots to a debate between Beninese university students on the reintroduction of the artefacts into Benin, revealing a nuanced examination of restitution and the ramifications of colonial history.
Dahomey (Diop, 2024) – 13th December
LATEST & GREATEST: THE TASTE OF THINGSJuliette Binoche) and the epicure she has spent the last twenty years cooking for, Dodin Bouffant (Benoît Magimel) as their relationship shifts from a professional one to a romantic one. However, Eugenie’s hesitance to fully commit to the romance puts Dodin behind the chopping board for once as he decides to cook for her in hopes of fully winning her heart.
A culinary and mouth-watering spectacle, Hùng spends a significant portion of the film detailing the process of the art of cooking in sizzling close-ups before shifting perspectives to the central couple of the film, reminding us of the shared ion that united them together in the first place.
The Taste of Things (Hùng, 2023) – 6th December
THE NAUGHTY LIST: ALTERNATIVE CHRISTMAS CLASSICS
Experience Yuletide this year with our The Naughty List: Alternative Christmas Classics collection, a series which honours the joyous symbols of Christmas while also diving deep into the lives of people from all walks of life during the festive season. Coming to the platform on 6 December is Todd Haynes’ wintry and six-time Academy Award-nominated Carol (2015). Set in the 1950s, Carol (Cate Blanchett) and Therese (Rooney Mara) are two women who fall for each other and must decide to either pursue their hearts or fall in line with the status quo of repressed society.
Meanwhile, Álex de la Iglesia’s The Day of the Beast (1995) examines Christmas through the perspective of a Basque priest in his attempts to ward off the return of Satan, while Sean Baker’s Tangerine (2015) sees Christmas Eve through the eyes of Los Angeles sexworkers and their adventures across the city.
Carol (Haynes, 2015) – 6th December
The Day of the Beast (de la Iglesia, 1995) – Now Streaming
Rare Exports: A Christmas Tale (Helander, 2010) – Now Streaming
Tangerine (Baker, 2015) – Now Streaming
LATEST & GREATEST: TRAILER OF THE FILM THAT WILL NEVER EXIST: ‘PHONY WARS’
Jean-Luc Godard’s Trailer of the Film That Will Never Exist: Phony Wars (2023) is a radical experimental short that assembles a montage of photographs, collages, sketches, and handwritten notes to form a visual palimpsest of a film that never came to be. Premiering at the 76th Cannes Film Festival, the piece offers an intimate glimpse into Godard’s creative process, blending sound, image, and text to reflect the essence of his life’s work.
Released posthumously in 2022, Trailer of the Film That Will Never Exist: Phony Wars (2023) was originally conceived as an adaptation of Charles Plisnier’s 1930s short story Carlotta, but was halted by the COVID-19 pandemic. Through its fragmented collage of ideas and references, it stands as a final statement from one of cinema’s most influential innovators.
Trailer of the Film That Will Never Exist: ‘Phony Wars’ (Godard, 2023) – 1st December
LATEST & GREATEST: AN URBAN ALLEGORY
A new collaboration between beloved director Alice Rohrwacher and renowned street artist JR, An Urban Allegory (2024) is a visually arresting and relevant short that seamlessly blends street art, philosophy, and sound design. A union of artistic talent, the short also features a score by Thomas Bangalter (of Daft Punk) and a cameo from acclaimed director Leos Carax, inviting a philosophical reflection on the fractured nature of modern society.
In Paris, a ballerina arrives incredibly late for an audition for a production of Plato’s Allegory of the Cave with her imaginative young son in tow. Nevertheless, the director allows her to perform, and whispers the secret of the cave to her son, who escapes into an artistic and philosophical fantasy across Paris.
An Urban Allegory (Rohrwacher & JR, 2023) – 20th December
MUBI RETROSPECTIVE: BEST OF 2024
2024 saw a wave of bold, inventive cinema, and MUBI Retrospective: Best of 2024 celebrates the year’s standout titles, including many titles from our own MUBI releases. From festival award-winners to indie gems, this collection brings together the most exciting films of the year offering an eclectic fusion of genres and voices, showcasing both established masters and rising talents.
The Taste of Things (Hùng, 2023) – 6th December
Dahomey (Diop, 2024) – 13th December
27 (Buda, 2023) – Now Streaming
Dammi (Demange, 2023) – Now Streaming
Fallen Leaves (Kaurismäki, 2023) – Now Streaming
Io capitano (Garrone, 2023) – Now Streaming
La Chimera (Rohrwacher, 2023) – Now Streaming
Robot Dreams (Berger, 2023) – Now Streaming
Crossing (Akin, 2024) – Now Streaming
The Substance (Fargeat, 2024) – Now Streaming
LATEST & GREATEST: CALIGULA: THE ULTIMATE CUT
Banned in several countries upon its original release in 1979, Tinto Brass’s Caligula: The Ultimate Cut (2023) reveals the deviant film in a new light. This reconstructed Caligula restores the entire performances of Malcolm McDowell and Hellen Mirren and follows Caligula (Malcolm McDowell) as he takes control of the Roman Empire following the assassination of his family. As Caligula rises to ascension, Rome increasingly becomes a place of corruption and perversion and he faces an ongoing series of humiliations.
Once described by Variety as a ‘moral holocaust’, the extensive reconstruction of the film maintains the erotic charge of the original but affords more time to the magnificent artistry that makes up the film by prioritising its nuanced content and breathtaking costume and set design.
Caligula: The Ultimate Cut (Brass, 2023) – 20th December
CHRISTMAS CRACKERS: THREE EALING COMEDIES
From the prolific Ealing Studios comes three of their best comedic outputs with our Christmas Cracker: Three Ealing Comedies collection, a celebration of British comedy during the post-war period, each directed by Alexander Mackendrick. Whiskey Galore! (1949), based on a true story, sees a ship carrying 50,000 cases of whisky leading to Jamaica sink outside of a small island in Scotland, at first thrilling the locals but then inciting a small rebellion. In The Man in the White Suit (1951), a scientist invents a new type of clothing that is indestructible and repels dirt, but in doing so attracts the heat of the fashion industry who will financially stagnate if his invention reaches the market, while The Ladykillers (1955) follows a motley crew of five criminals as they lodge at a sweet but naive older lady’s house while planning a bank robbery in disguise as a string quartet.
Whisky Galore! (Mackendrick, 1949) –13th December
The Man in the White Suit (Mackendrick, 1951) – 13th December
The Ladykillers (Mackendrick, 1955) – 13th December
SHE DIES TOMORROW

Amy Seimetz’s enigmatic She Dies Tomorrow (2020) follows Amy (Kate Lyn Sheil), a woman convinced that she is going to die tomorrow. Beginning with Amy revealing her routined daily life as she meanders around her newly bought house, eventually the feeling of impending death begins to seep into the fabric of the film around her, affecting her friends as a contagious blight. As Amy’s anxiety deepens, the lives of everybody orbiting her begin to unravel into insanity.
She Dies Tomorrow (Seimetz, 2020) – 8th December
MUBI UK & IRELAND DECEMBER 2024
01/12/2024 | Trailer of the Film That Will Never Exist: ‘Phony Wars’ | Jean-Luc Godard | Latest & Greatest
01/12/2024 | Nightingale | Jennifer Kent [Review]
06/12/2024 | Carol | Todd Haynes | The Naughty List: Alternative Christmas Classics [Review]
06/12/2024 | The Taste of Things | Trần Anh Hùng | Latest & Greatest [Review]
08/12/2024 | She Dies Tomorrow | Any Seimetz
13/12/2024 | The Ladykillers | Alexander Mackendrick | Christmas Crackers: Three Ealing Comedies
13/12/2024 | The Man in the White Suit | Alexander Mackendrick | Christmas Crackers: Three Ealing Comedies
13/12/2024 | Whisky Galore! | Alexander Mackendrick | Christmas Crackers: Three Ealing Comedies
13/12/2024 | Dahomey | Mati Diop | MUBI Releases
13/12/2024 | Atlantics | Mati Diop
20/12/2024 | Caligula: The Ultimate Cut | Tinto Brass | Latest & Greatest
20/12/2024 | An Urban Allegory | Alex Rohrwacher & JR | Latest & Greatest
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